They feel they've added starting talent. They feel there is better depth. Or, to rephrase, they feel exactly the way all 32 teams do in the immediate aftermath of a draft.

What's different this time is how San Diego got here.

A front office doesn't fire a general manager, hire a new one and lose its director of player personnel in January without meeting some extra challenges leading up to April. The group that completed this draft was a scouting department and coaching staff in transition, and for that, there seems an added sense of pride at Chargers Park for completing what those involved believe can prove to be both a strong draft and post-draft rookie free agency period.

Now, for the scouting department, its transition continues.

The draft's conclusion begins a new draft calendar year. Jimmy Raye's replacement wasn't hired in January. His position as director of player personnel is expected to be filled, perhaps within the next month or so.

The team divides the country into five sections. Maybe that'll grow to six. Maybe they'll trim it to four. Maybe states that are part of one region will become part of another.

All that is part of a greater restructure soon to come.

“We'll evaluate the football operations department, but the guys we have here did a tremendous job,” general manager Tom Telesco said. “I couldn't be more proud of a group of guys. I get here in January. We have a lot of new coaches. The scouts aren't new, but it's a new process for them. They took it and they ran with it.”

When Telesco arrived, so, too, came a system of how to run football operations.

Only so much of that plan can be applied in January, which John Spanos, Chargers executive vice president of football operations, calls the "halfway point” in the draft process.

So, some changes had to wait to be implemented whereas others didn't.

A fewer number of people were kept in this year's draft room. And Spanos, who was careful when complimenting Telesco's methods to insist he wasn't suggesting the previous regime did things wrong or in an especially different manner, did note Telesco's approach to draft meetings.

“The best way I could sum up Tom's style is he's got a much more Socratic Method, if that makes sense,” Spanos said. “Much more dialogue and much more stimulating conversation to help us problem-solve instead of maybe asking scouts to just read their reports, and, 'OK, we're going onto the next guy.'

“This year, it was much more, 'OK, read your reports. Here's what you said about this player. Now, how come you have him ranked ahead of this guy? Who would you really take between these two guys? Let's discuss.' There was just more conversation.”

The word for the three-day draft Telesco uses is “smooth.”

He slept Thursday night on the thought of trading up for Manti Te'o after the linebacker slipped to the second round. Telesco awoke Friday deciding to go for it and began making calls around the league.

The Cardinals were willing to trade back if Te'o was there at No. 38.

When he was, San Diego had to call Arizona. It had to call the NFL office. It had to relay the pick to those on the ground in New York City.

“It's hard to practice that,” Telesco said. “You have to do it on the clock. It was as smooth as any that I've been around, and none of us had worked together before. I was real happy with that and the whole process.”